Winter Blahs!

     I got the winter blahs this year but [so far] at least not the winter blues [seasonal affective disorder] which for me requires the use of a special light in the mornings. I don't know why I haven't been afflicted by S.A.D. this winter [so far]. Maybe it is because I've been spending more time outdoors or maybe it's because physical exercise has now become a habit for me. I know one thing for damn sure-- this [temporary?] improvement is not due to my eating habits or my non-improving insomnia. 

     Hey. Even if the blues come back, I'm good with that. I'm happy not to be experiencing them right now. And I know what to do if they should impinge upon my little world this winter.

     The birds around me have been anything but blah. I've observed mixed flocks of chickadees plus in the backyard feeders along with some woodpeckers. The juncos continue to eat from the platform feeders and the crazy little titmice continue to occupy the tree and sing vigorously. The Canada geese are still flying overhead, heading south. I've observed several families of mallards at local creeks, including one family that was swimming in close proximity to a blue heron.  There have also been various hawks-- mainly kestrels-- hanging on tree branches stalking out dinner.

     The weather has been a bit trying. I don't object to snow. I don't care for freezing rain. So far we've had very little snow and way too much freezing rain this winter. The temperatures cycling twenty degrees or more on an almost daily basis is annoying to me but there is nothing much I can do about the weather here short of moving. 

     Here it is December and we have no snow base on the ground at all. Unless I want to pay to x-c ski or snowshoe through "groomed" trails with fake snow [and no, I don't], I will continue to have to use my boot or sneaker clad feet to ambulate through the woods. The dog wags her tail and makes excitement noises when it is snowing but she doesn't seem overly bothered by the lack of the fluffy stuff outside. She also hates ice and in that we are united.

sapphoq n friends

Bird Feeders October 19, 2014

     I threw out some more un-shelled peanuts. Once again, a red-headed woodpecker stopped by. It flitted around the tree and left.

     I've also seen the long red-winged blackbird. He is without his grackle buddies who have all flown for the winter. I don't understand why he is not hanging with the rest of the red-wings along the creek by the wetlands in the neighborhood. At least he seems to be getting enough to eat. When he comes to the backyard, he is a ground feeder. He lands on the far branch of the mock cherry, looks around, and then flies down to the ground. On the ground, he moves around slowly, pecking at whatever leftovers are there. He never drinks from the various water sources in the yard nor does he ever stray more than ten feet from the tree.

     Those crazy titmice are still around. They continue to descend upon the cherry tree in small bunches. Now they are quieter than when the weather is warmer. They spend more time eating than flitting around. [A few weeks ago, it was the opposite.]

     Chickadees, blue jays, goldfinches, a  few red and purple finches, the mourning doves, and lots of house sparrows round out the list of the regulars. I'm waiting for the mixed flocks but so far not that.

    The weather is shifting. It is colder and the wind has kicked up. Canada geese have been flocking up and leaving. The kestrels continue to zoom around in great numbers overhead. Perhaps they are picking small songbirds from the air.

sapphoq n friends

Bird Feeders and Woods, October 4, 2014

     I had a surprise visitor twice last week-- a red-headed woodpecker on two separate afternoons-- at the feeders. Quite a beautiful bird. The red head [no, I know it wasn't a pileated. We have them regularly] was startling as was the sleekness of the black upper body, the wing patches, and the white lower body. He or she gave a call both times and ate a bit of corn before disappearing. The other birds around [including the hairy couple] did not appear to respond to the brief presence of the medium sized woodpecker. We used to have more of them here as I remember. Or perhaps they got better at hiding. I'm not sure which.

     I threw more whole unshelled peanuts out with the predictable response of joy from bunches of blue jays in the neighborhood. The one younger that appeared to initially have a "too small misshapen" head originally has filled out to be a beauty. The blue coloring on the head and neck appear to be darker than the other jays still. The head now appears to be right-sized to me.

     Shelled peanuts enticed some tufted titmice to examine the bucket that I put them in. One was especially flapping around with vigor. Other birds and the two younger squirrels [who are now grown with beautiful bushy tails] and one of the chipmunks partook of that feast.

     The usual suspects continue to hang in the yard-- three mourning doves on a fence this morning, one in the tree yesterday, chickadees galore, goldfinches, house sparrows, hairys, downys, two rock doves [to my annoyance but I let them be], but no more grackles. Canada geese fly overhead frequently, splitting before the snow. And kestrels continue in large numbers. A couple of unidentified [as of yet] sparrows also came along. I hope they come back so I can determine what they are.

     On a recent woodswalk, the humidity was so high that some of the embedded stones were sweating. Also, I did see black bear marks on one tree in particular. My guess from the size of the marks is that the bear is big. I did not smell bear however so perhaps that particular bear was just lumbering through. We do have them across the river on a regular basis though, and close enough to smell at times. Bears smell musty to me, like a cheap rundown motel room that hasn't been cleaned up in ages.

     I was relieved to find that the idio well-meaning person who had been leaving birdseed on a fallen tree trunk in the woods has quit. It was the kind of seed that mourning doves would prefer. At any rate, it certainly isn't necessary or wise to leave such a thing out.

     We've had humidity and misty rain and the leaves are about halfway through. Folks here like to "predict" how the winter is going to be. The most accurate way is the height of the beaver lodges but I haven't been near those of late.

          sapphoq and old dog friend

Bird News September 20, 2014

 

I took the picture and added the frame and text with my legally obtained photo software. Copyright trolls and DMCA freaks, go away. To the rest of you, you can right-click and save to your "My Computer" if you want to. No hot-linking. Credit not necessary if using the picture on any form of social media.

     Kestrels have been out in abundance. I usually see one in a tree  once or twice a month, but lately I've seen bunches of them on the air currents daily. They are just all over. I saw a particularly handsome one [m, f-- who knows?] sailing over a small farm village today circling in for a landing. The kestrels have a characteristic way of holding their wings when drifting and a particular shape to their wings as well.

     Hairys and downies continue to grace the feeders. They like the sunflower kernels and the suet. If there are peanuts, they eat those too. The male hairy checked out our deck one night, working himself along the rails. I figure he was checking for wood bees. They've been much less in evidence since I painted over and taped a couple new wood bee holes. It seems to me like the hairies-- both the male and the female-- spend more time at the feeders than either one of the pair of downies. The downies pretty much seem to grab a few bites and go.

     The goldfinches have reverted out of their breeding colors. I can recognize them by their voice now along with how they approach and land at the sunflower kernel feeder. The house sparrows and the goldfinches had a squabble at the feeder one afternoon. One ambitious house sparrow tried to scare one of the hairys off the suet to no avail. The hairy puffed himself up and stood vertical with his wings slightly out from his body. The house sparrow left. The chickadees never seem to fight or squabble with any bird. They remain gregarious as usual and a few buzz me when I am sitting on the deck. One buzzed me the other day as I was filling the feeders.

     There have been individual song sparrow, fox sparrow, and chippy [chipping sparrow] this summer but no white-throats or white-heads. Less sparrows in general at the backyard feeders it seems this year. The grackles still come around and several habitually ring the bell near one of the platform feeders. I've discovered that grackles and crows will peck at bits of the pregnant onion plant hanging in a pot on the choke cherry tree. A cedar waxwing flew in one day and ate a cherry before darting off again. Migrating or checking it out, who knows? Some years ago, I did get to witness a line of cedar waxwings passing cherries along. That was kind of neat.

     When I throw un-shelled raw peanuts in the garden and in the platform feeder, all of the blue jays in the neighborhood descend upon the yard to carry the peanuts away one by one. A few will crack one open on a nearby tree branch [usually the aspen or the oak] but soon they also carry them away. They hold the un-shelled peanut by one end as they fly off.

     Today I tried some sliced [leftover] almonds on the ground. Within a minute, one of the squirrels came dashing along the fence. He dove down the mock cherry tree and into the scattered almonds without hesitation. Maybe he'd had them before. Or maybe squirrels have an acute sense of smell. I don't really know. Another squirrel also came along and promptly began eating the almonds also. A mourning dove toppled out of the cherry tree, acting very startled. I don't know why. It was a younger dove with dark tail and a few outside white underlying feathers. It ignored the squirrels and the almonds and went over to the corn and black sunflower seeds. The two younger blue jays-- and a new third that I didn't recognize-- landed in the tree. They hopped to the ground and quickly ate some of the almonds before flying away again. They also hopped rather than walked along the ground so I suspect that blue jays don't spend a lot of time ground feeding. Walking on the ground is more practical and birds that are habitual ground feeders have evolved to walk rather than hop. Flickers-- and one of the ones in the neighborhood finally dropped in-- are woodpeckers which are evolving to become ground birds. Two chipmunks each took over a platform to munch on the corn and seeds. They did not appear to be interested at all in the almond slices.

     At a nearby park the other day with a creek running through it [not the usual park with the creek where I spotted the yellow warbler once] there was a flock of Canada geese. The old dog drank from the water but did not want to go swimming so I didn't make her. Up the creek was a fine great blue heron, some mallards, and some blacks [ducks] or black-mallard crosses. Mallards are notorious for mating with other species of ducks, particularly blacks. The mallards/blacks were dabbling when something I couldn't see must have startled them. They swam en masse to the other shore. A lone duck swam up behind the group, with only his neck and head on the surface of the water. Then he dove and disappeared from my sight totally. I don't think it was a male mallard. (They are dabblers and don't swim underwater much if at all). But I didn't get enough field marks to be able to even guess at the species. A kingfisher determinedly flew up the creek and landed in a treetop to go fishing. We walked up the side of the creek a bit and flushed a solitary muskrat. The muskrat lodge was on the opposite side from where we were. The muskrat set off in that direction but soon went underwater.

     The lone red-winged blackbird comes less and less. Perhaps he has finally figured out that he is a red-wing and not a grackle like his grackle buddies.